What is a Medicare Supplement Agent/Broker?

A Medicare insurance broker is an independent agent who gives you an unbiased opinion on your Medicare plan options. Many different insurance companies appoint them so that they can find the right fit for you. Your Medicare broker will be able to recommend a plan tailored to your individual needs and budget. When it comes to deciding on your Medicare options, you can spend hours doing your research or you can speak to a local, licensed Texas agent with Ashford Insurance. Your agent will compare your options to find the coverage that’s tailored to you and at a price that fits into your budget. We do this all at no cost and with no obligation to you. With an Ashford Insurance agent, you get the benefit of great counsel, experience, and great choices.

What is a Medicare Supplement?

The Medicare Supplement plans are designed to be subscribed to the right alongside a valid Original Medicare plan, offering complementary coverage without ever overlapping. Supplement plans will not work with Advantage plans, so if you need one of them, then you need to choose only one.

Medicare Supplement Insurance (Medigap) can help with some costs that Original Medicare doesn’t cover. 

Medigap is extra health insurance that you buy from a private company to pay health care costs not covered by Original Medicare, such as co-payments, deductibles, and health care if you travel.

The plans are Federally-standardized. What this means is that it is relatively easy to compare the different plan options. You are comparing “apples to apples”. The plans go by the standardized plans chart.

What this means is that a Medigap Plan F with one company is the same as a Plan F with another company. Plan F is the most comprehensive plan, and it is also the most common. However, some of the other plans, including Medigap Plan G and Medigap Plan N, provide comprehensive supplemental coverage, at a lower monthly premium cost.

To understand the differences in the plans, we can easily review the coverage with you. NO Medicare supplemental insurance plans cover medications. The plans do, however, cover things that Medicare covers. The easiest way to think of it is that, if Medicare covers it, the supplemental plan will fill in the “gaps”. But if it is something that Medicare doesn’t cover (i.e. dental, experimental procedures, etc.), the supplemental plan likely will not cover it either.

There are no annual enrollment periods for Medicare supplemental plans – this is a common misconception. The Part D drug plans do have an annual enrollment period, which has probably led to the development of the belief that you can only change, or enroll in, a supplement plan during this certain time of the year. You can, however, enroll in a plan at any time.

That said, you DO have to answer medical questions (in most cases) when you enroll in a Medicare Supplemental insurance plan UNLESS you are in an “open enrollment” or “guaranteed issue” situation.

Some of the most common occurrences of one of these situations are:

• Turning 65 and going on Medicare
• Enrolling in Medicare Part B
• Losing employer coverage
• Losing Medicare Advantage coverage
• Moving to a new state and out of your plan’s service area

If you fall into one of these (or several other) open enrollment or guaranteed issue situations, you can enroll in a Medicare Supplemental plan without having to answer any medical questions, pay a higher rate because of pre-existing conditions, or be denied coverage based on your health. Because of that, these are the optimum times to enroll in a plan. If you are in one of these situations, you are well-advised to take advantage and enroll at that time.

As of January 1, 2020, Medigap plans sold to new people with Medicare aren’t allowed to cover the Part B deductible. Because of this, Plans C and F are not available to people new to Medicare starting on January 1, 2020.